[ Solved ]: The ‘ObjectContent`1’ type failed to serialize the response body for content type ‘application/xml; charset=utf-8’.

This Error:
The ‘ObjectContent`1’ type failed to serialize the response body for content type ‘application/xml; charset=utf-8’.

can be fixed by adding one line of code to your data model’s context class

public partial class YOURENTITYCLASS: DbContext
{
public YOURENTITY(){
base.Configuration.ProxyCreationEnabled = false;
}
...

Many times it triggers when you have foreign key constraints within your Entity Data Model.

ASP.Net State Drop Down Lists

U.S. States


--Select--
Alabama
Alaska
Arizona
Arkansas
California
Colorado
Connecticut
District of Columbia
Delaware
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Mississippi
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
North Carolina
North Dakota
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Wyoming

U.S. States (abbreviated)


- See more at: http://dan.folkes.me/2011/08/09/asp-dropdownlist-states-listitem-example/#sthash.OnOXMSkf.dpuf